There's been a lot of scuttlebutt passed around on the internetover the last two weeks, and it's all pretty awesome. This week, the rumor mill is churning that Ivy Bridge MacBooks may be closer than we think. The Apple Store has a depleting supply of Sandy Bridge MacBook Pros, which makes room in the back for brand new hardware. Also, the iPhone 5 could be the biggest handset refresh we've had since the iPhone 4's rounded corners, and Apple could be working on software to help beginning developers get their bearings with app development. Let’s get down to business, shall we?

One thing Apple is great about is making you lust after their latest hardware. Another thing Apple is great at is making hardware that lasts so long you don't need to run out and buy the latest and greatest. So we've got a little mix of both of those strengths this week.

Tired of the tedious conversion process it takes to get your iOS device to play back videos? Want to watch your videos in more than just the handfull of proprietary file formats? Fortunately, there’s an app for that. You can play almost any video format under the sun on your iPad with the PlayerXtreme app. Read on to learn how.

It was hard to miss the big story of the day: Facebook is acquiring Instagram, which suddenly makes the furor over the photo sharing service finally arriving on Android pale in comparison to the hate being spewed at both companies today. But what about the little stories that fall between the cracks? Thankfully we’ve collected them here for your reading pleasure on this manic Monday, April 9, 2012.

Now that the new iPad is sporting a Retina Display, it's noticeable when an app isn't optimized for the sceen's high definition resolution. Fortunately, a good chunk of our favorite apps have been updated to work with the iPad, including Apple's apps, Facebook, and even Netflix, despite the fact that it might be a bit of a bandwidth killer for all that video. But, there are still a few slow movers in the App Store, and here's three we desperately wish would hurry up and optimize!

Fact: There’s no such thing as too much storage. The more memory that a device has, the happier its owner will be. There is however, such a thing as paying too much for extra storage, and that’s why we’ve yet to see an iPad or an iPhone with a higher capacity than 64GB.

If you’re building a mobile device like a smartphone, tablet or even a laptop, flash storage, also known as a solid-state drive (SSD) is the way to go. As they contain no moving parts, they’re less likely to break down over time due to repetitive motion, and if the device they’re baked into gets dropped, there’s no risk of the kind of data loss that we associate with old school hard drives. Since there are no drive platters, there are no drive platters to damage. They’re also wicked fast compared to traditional hard drives.

Everyone's been noticing an uptick in their app updates now that the big new iPad Retina Display is here. While you were busy tapping over and over that yes, you were aware other browsers would let you view adult content, a bunch of other things were going on and we nabbed some of them jsut for you. Aren't we sweet?

The deals are bumping this week with some serious accessory action and a really darn good deal that's all about getting you up out of your chair and outside away from your computer, nerds, so get reading.

iTunes was the original all-access music application, but since the introduction of iOS devices, it's morphed into a hodgepodge of apps, music, movies, application data, and other iOS-device data storage. If this ever-growing mixture of services is a bit too much for you to handle, then why not consider another method to get data onto your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad?

With iOS 5, Apple finally cut the cord, allowing users to set up their iOS devices without the use of iTunes. We’ll use this functionality, along with some additional apps and services, to finally say, “good riddance” to iTunes.